17-Foot Python Slithers Into Family Picnic in Everglades, Days Before Florida "Python Challenge" 2013 Hunting Contest Begins (Full Video)

A family from Arkansas is wishing Florida's Python Challenge 2013 started sooner, when a 17-foot Burmese python slithered through their picnic in the Everglades.

The pythons are an invasive species in Florida, killing endangered species like the Key Largo wood rat and the wood stork.

Non-endangered animals are at risk too, with park rangers estimating that 99 percent of bobcats, raccoons and opossums have been eaten by the massive snakes in some areas of the swamp.

To curb the snake population, the state of Florida is holding its first Python Challenge, beginning January 12.

A $1,500 grand prize will go the hunter who kills the most pythons during the month-long contest, which runs through Feb. 10.

A $1,000 prize goes to the person who kills the longest snake within that same time period.

The family from Arkansas might have won that prize if they'd been able to kill the snake that invaded their picnic.

At 17 feet, that snake was nearly as long as the longest Burmese python ever caught in the Everglades, which measured 17 feet, 7 inches.

After the family found the snake, they alerted park rangers, who shot it, likely in the head, as that is the most humane way to dispose of the snakes.

Anyone interested in participating in the Python Challenge must pay a $25 registration fee, take an online safety course on python hunting and sign a liability waiver. The snakes usually eat smaller prey, but they have been known to attack deer and other large mammals and wouldn't be above nabbing a tasty human snack if the opportunity should present itself.

To give amateur snake hunters a chance, two sets of prizes will be awarded, one set to professionals who already have python hunting licenses and another to hunters only signing up for the contest.

The United States Department of the Interior banned the importation of Burmese pythons into the country in 2012, but scientists estimate at least 10,000 of the snakes are still living in the wild, many of which were originally pets that were released into the wild and began breeding.